Can I really grow saffron (kesar) outside Kashmir and is the at-home box farming real?

Let me be honest with you because there is a lot of false marketing here. Saffron (Crocus sativus) needs a very specific climate, cold winters with snow or frost and a dry warm autumn flowering period. That is why it grows mainly in Pampore in Kashmir at around 1500 to 2000 metres. People sell expensive corm kits and aeroponic boxes claiming lakhs from one room. The plant biology is real, the lab grown indoor saffron is being trialled, but the profit numbers in those videos are almost always exaggerated to sell you corms and equipment. Yield is tiny per corm, roughly 1 gram of dry saffron needs about 150 flowers, and each corm gives only 1 to 3 flowers. In the plains the corms may flower once then weaken because they do not get the cold cycle to multiply. Before spending money, treat any scheme that guarantees fixed income as suspect, verify with your KVK, and start very small. Genuine field saffron outside Kashmir is being tried in parts of Himachal, Uttarakhand and the Northeast hills at similar altitude, not in hot plains.